Completing Projects

We are half-way through January already, and I am glad to be in a new year.

Our humble little homeschool is going well.

It certainly feels like the Lord is moving us along and blessing our family.

Having all my children home with me - eating, laughing, chatting, reading, and working through our lessons together, feels like the most luxurious life any mother could have.

Our snowy winter scenes from just a few weeks ago have melted into mild, wet weather, reminiscent more of mid-March than January.

As I stirred raw honey into my tea and glanced outside at a rainy afternoon, I became aware that I am long overdue for a project completion post. Several posts ago I mentioned adding a half bath upstairs, and the paint color the kids selected is called Rainy Afternoon.

We are thrilled to have another bathroom in the house! It has proven quite useful.

 It's tiny, so it's tricky to get a good photo...

(The "before" photos...)

Can you believe this is the same space?

Micah built the bathroom around this small window, and moved some of the cabinets further down the wall.

The biggest headache of this renovation was just clearing the room out! It was an "out of sight, out of mind" junk room for many years.

But once everything was either sold or hauled to the dump, the remainder of the space was turned into an activity room for the kids.

We use the room for art, crafts, and science experiments. The TV is for looking up YouTube tutorials to help us in our creative pursuits. (But I like listening to a "coffee shop jazz" channel while I fiddle with watercolor.)

There are still a few purchases I'd like to make for the room, such as a wall clock and dry erase board for this blank wall.

Even though the activity room and bathroom have technically been complete for several months now, they are already well used and loved, and feel as though they have been with us all along. 

You may remember (many posts ago!) that I was in the process of getting illustrations done for a children's book that I had written.

After a patient process, my illustrator completed the pictures this past fall. I was thrilled, but the binder sat, almost forgotten, in a back corner of my closet until I could find the time to do something with it.

 

I figured I'd get through the holidays first, then find a way to publish my long-awaited book.

But to my complete shock, the gift I had opened Christmas morning, in my living room with my family, contained a printed hardcopy of my book!

(I may or may not have burst into tears, making everyone uncomfortable!)

Roman and Micah had snuck around behind my back, submitted my manuscript and illustrations to a self-publishing website, and printed my book, Big Girl Helper.

It's probably been around 3 or 4 years since the idea for the book hit me like a lightening bolt, and I sat down with a notebook and pencil and wrote the entire manuscript in one sitting by hand.

From that time on I have always fantasized about what it might feel like to hold the finished, printed copy in my hands. I was stunned Christmas morning at the fruition of that dream.

I am grateful to my illustrator for making my little book come to life. The book's beautiful, glossy pages, and colorful pictures perfectly achieved the homey, cheery vibe I was going for.

I am hoping I can find a way to print out more so I can give them away as gifts and possibly even sell them. (Although I realize I will never make any money from this. Haha. But I guess that wasn't really the point.)

After many years of reading countless children's books to my children, I knew the inspiring value and wholesome influence of worthy books on a growing child's mind. Books that represent real, human characters demonstrating attributes like loyalty to home and family. 

If you share those ideals, and have children or grandchildren around the ages of three through five, you may enjoy my book. 

Let me know if you'd like a copy, as one of my New Year's goals is to print more!

Thanks for stopping by my blog today, friends.

I hope to be back in Blogland more often in 2023...

💐

~ Courtney 

Celebrating 12 Years

 We bought our farmhouse in July 2009.

That means we have lived here for twelve years!

I didn't want this month to end without recognizing our house-anniversary here on my blog.

Our farmhouse is over 100 years old, and has embraced families with a sense of home for generations.

This greatly appealed to me, as I have always had a heart for old homes.

My grandparents fixed up an old farmhouse when I was a kid in the 1990's. Their use of floral prints, antiques, built-in bookshelves, and other authentic elements, had caused that house to leave a permanent etch upon my heart...

This is what home feels like.

"We shape our dwellings, and afterward our dwellings shape us."

- Winston Churchill

Micah, being from Texas, wanted a place in the country. 

He wanted hunting land, trails, privacy and space to roam.

Twelve years ago we found this piece of property, with this old house sitting happily on it, and have been pouring our hearts into this place ever since.

We would not be who we are today if it weren't for our move here.

It has truly shaped us.

It has tried our patience, and taught us commitment.

These old homes need gentle owners who understand it is better to respect their past than to chase modern trends.

That has always been fine with me.

My style is less "new from Hobby Lobby," and more my mother saying, "Aunt Marilyn was cleaning out a cupboard and wants you to have her bowls."

My home is a mix of family hand-me-downs and my own finds from treasure hunting in antique stores.

Remember, I like to use my blog to record family stories and house renovations. So, to celebrate twelve years, I would like to share some before and after photos.

The following is a small collection of photos of what the house looked like in July 2009, and what it looks like today.

I hope you enjoy this look into my home.

We have tried our best to love her well through these twelve years.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 

The kitchen:

The barn:

Dining room:

The laundry room:

Bedroom:

Family room:

Front room:

Staircase:

Hallway:

Front door:

Front yard:

Micah built this arch for me for my birthday last summer because it's always been my dream to have climbing roses.

I haven't planted any yet, however, so that will be my next project.

🌹🌹🌹

Thanks for stopping by my blog today, friends.

I hope you all are enjoying your summer.

💐

~ Courtney 

A Pretty Laundry Room

Hello again, friends.

We've done some sprucing up in our laundry room recently, and I have a few photos I'd like to share.

This is my new, pretty laundry room...

At some point a previous owner of our house converted an upstairs room into a laundry room.

I've always liked having the laundry upstairs.

It's very convenient.

And since we live in a very old farmhouse, with an unfinished fieldstone basement, it would not be very lovely to spend my days down there doing laundry.

It's much nicer to do laundry upstairs where it's bright.

Nonetheless, we still decided it was high time to spruce the room up.

Here is a before photo...

The plan:

Paint over the blue

Replace the windows

Sand and poly the floor

Make it pretty!

*smile

The kids are at great ages to help!

Roman completely removed the old wallpaper border for me.

I was thankful I didn't have to do it!

They also enjoyed removing old nails, filling holes and wiping woodwork down.

My crew!...

Aren't they cute?

Here are a few during photos...

The room has this very large, blank wall. So I decided to paper it in a colorful vintage rose pattern as an accent wall.

An annoying fact about wallpapering is that you should over-order since you will need more than you think. However, because of pattern repeats, you will have a ton of waste in the end.

It is worth it, though.

I love how it turned out, and I think it fits my old-fashioned house very well.

When I finished papering the accent wall, Micah sanded the floor...

And replaced the windows...

For as long as we've lived in this house, I have had a junky old cabinet in this room to hold my laundry and cleaning supplies.

Micah offered to fix it up and paint it for me.

He made new trim for along the top and bottom and put it up on these decorative wooden feet.

My mother came to the paint store with me to help me pick out a bright, celery green that matched my new wallpaper.

It sure was fun to organize and put all my supplies back in a fresh, new cabinet!

Now for a few after photos...

I put the panes on the new windows and sewed cafe style curtains for them.

Do you like the little trim detail along the edge?

That's my favorite part...

I was given a collection of bird prints recently as a gift, so I decided to frame and hang three of them on the wall above the laundry machines.

It's easy to make out the sparrow and robin, but there's a glare on the middle one. It's chickadees on a pine bough covered in snow, and it is my favorite.

I love looking at them while I stand here folding laundry each day.

Isn't Regal sweet? He loves to be wherever I am. (He's actually sitting right here on my lap as I type this.)

Where are you going? You're not leaving, are you?

I placed a cute plant stand in the corner so I would have something fresh and pretty to look at as I iron.

I leave my ironing board out all the time.

I would really like to get into a better routine of daily ironing now that I have such a pretty room to do it in.

I placed a little chair in front of my ironing board because sometimes Nola or Elsa will read to me in the afternoons while I iron.

They used to just plunk themselves down right on the floor, but now they have a nice chair.

Isn't it a bright and happy room?

I am enjoying it so much!

There's always something that can be improved when you're a homeowner.

I'm glad we took the time to give ourselves a pretty laundry room.

xo,

~ Courtney ~